1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of digital medical imagery and more particularly to a application interface to the provision of Digital Imaging Communications in Medicine (DICOM) services. A framework of service objects is provided which enables a programmer to easily develop application methods which provide DICOM services or other custom services. An object-oriented application interface is provided. The objects provide a map between DICOM standard service objects and a group of associated objects within a framework. The associated service objects work together to provide a DICOM service. The service objects comprise a method or a computer program which operates in conformance with the DICOM standard.
2. Description of the Related Art
Modern hospitals and diagnostic clinics use medical imagery workstations to access digitized medical imagery derived from a variety of imagery source devices or imagery "modalities." Multiple imagery source devices may be connected via hospital information networks to hospital devices such as viewing workstations, film printers, or optical storage devices. Hospitals typically use a Picture Archival and Communication Systems (PACS) to import and manipulate imagery. PACS are only partial solutions to providing cost effective health care. In order to facilitate the medical professional's use of the complex PACS, and to reduce costs of using such a system, industry personnel have developed the Digital Imagining Communications in Medicine or "DICOM" standard.
The DICOM standard describes a protocol for medical imaging communication. DICOM is based upon the Open System Interconnect (OSI) reference model, which defines a 7-layer protocol model and is well-known to those of skill in the art. DICOM is an "application-level" standard. That is, the DICOM standard is implemented inside the seventh (7th) or uppermost level of the OSI model, the application level. DICOM provides standardized formats for images, a common information model, application service definitions, and a protocol for communication. The DICOM standard is an industry-wide standard, well known to those of skill in the art.
The DICOM standard specifies certain services and a protocol for the provision of those services to PACS users. DICOM, however, does not provide applications to provided DICOM service, or which conform to the DICOM standard protocol. Application development is left to the imagination and determination of system designers and application programmers, who must create, develop, implement (write code), and debug thousands of lines of computer code to develop applications which provide DICOM services and conform to the DICOM standard protocol.
Thus there is a need for a application programmers' interface to assist in development of computer applications which provide DICOM services and conform to the DICOM standard protocol. Such a toolkit would save hundreds of programming hours formerly necessary to write application programs in conformance with the DICOM standard.